Hong Kong’s government will scrap the land application list system – under which developers can trigger land auctions – in order to increase its control over the city’s land supply.
Secretary for Development Paul Chan Mo-po announced on Thursday the land application list system would be cancelled at the start of the 2013-14 financial year in April.
Under the system, a developer who wants to acquire a site on the application list submits a price to the Lands Department, which cannot be less than 80 per cent of the undisclosed price set by the government. If a developer’s submission meets this criterion, this triggers a public auction for the site.
The system was introduced in 1999 and was intended to complement the government’s regular land sales.
Regular land sales were in turn scrapped in 2002 because the economic downturn was pushing prices down.
Starting in 2010, the government began selling land again, but on an irregular basis, in an effort to boost supply and cool what were by then rising property prices.
